The Great Russian Revolution is the revolutionary events that took place in Russia in 1917, starting with the overthrow of the monarchy during the February Revolution, when power passed to the Provisional Government, which was overthrown as a result of the October Revolution of the Bolsheviks, who proclaimed Soviet power.

February Revolution of 1917 - The main revolutionary events in Petrograd

Reason for revolution: Labor conflict at the Putilov factory between workers and owners; interruptions in the supply of food to Petrograd.

Main events February Revolution took place in Petrograd. The leadership of the army, headed by the chief of staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, General Alekseev M.V., and the commanders of the fronts and fleets, considered that they did not have the means to suppress the riots and strikes that had engulfed Petrograd. Emperor Nicholas II abdicated. After his intended successor, Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich also abdicated, the State Duma took control of the country, forming the Provisional Government of Russia.

With the formation of Soviets parallel to the Provisional Government, a period of dual power began. The Bolsheviks form detachments of armed workers (Red Guards), thanks to attractive slogans, they are gaining considerable popularity, primarily in Petrograd, Moscow, in large industrial cities, the Baltic Fleet, and the troops of the Northern and Western fronts.

The results of the revolution and dual power

October Revolution of 1917 main events

During October revolution Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee, established by the Bolsheviks headed by L.D. Trotsky and V.I. Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government. At the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, the Bolsheviks endure a hard struggle against the Mensheviks and Right Social Revolutionaries, and the first Soviet government is formed. In December 1917, a government coalition of Bolsheviks and Left Social Revolutionaries was formed. In March 1918, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed with Germany.

By the summer of 1918, a one-party government was finally formed, and the active phase of the Civil War and foreign intervention in Russia began, which began with the uprising of the Czechoslovak Corps. The end of the Civil War created the conditions for the formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).

Provisional government of Russia in 1917

Heads of the Russian government in 1905 - 1917

Causes of the October Revolution of 1917:

• war weariness;
• industry and agriculture of the country were on the verge of complete collapse;
• catastrophic financial crisis;
• the unresolved agrarian question and the impoverishment of the peasants;
• delaying socio-economic reforms;
• the contradictions of the dual power became a prerequisite for a change of power.

On July 3, 1917, unrest broke out in Petrograd demanding the overthrow of the Provisional Government. Counter-revolutionary units, by government decree, used weapons to suppress the peaceful demonstration. Arrests began, the death penalty was restored.

The dual power ended with the victory of the bourgeoisie. The events of July 3-5 showed that the bourgeois Provisional Government did not intend to fulfill the demands of the working people, and it became clear to the Bolsheviks that it was no longer possible to seize power by peaceful means.

At the VI Congress of the RSDLP (b), which took place from July 26 to August 3, 1917, the party took a guide to the socialist revolution through an armed uprising.

At the August State Conference in Moscow, the bourgeoisie intended to announce L.G. Kornilov as a military dictator and time the dispersal of the Soviets to coincide with this event. But the active revolutionary uprising frustrated the plans of the bourgeoisie. Then Kornilov on August 23 moved troops to Petrograd.

The Bolsheviks, carrying out great agitation work among the working masses and soldiers, explained the meaning of the conspiracy and created revolutionary centers for the struggle against Kornilovism. The rebellion was suppressed, and the people finally understood that the Bolshevik Party is the only party that defends the interests of the working people.

In mid-September, V.I. Lenin worked out a plan for an armed uprising and ways to carry it out. The main goal of the October Revolution was the conquest of power by the Soviets.

On October 12, the Military Revolutionary Committee (MRC) was created - a center for preparing an armed uprising. Zinoviev and Kamenev, opponents of the socialist revolution, gave the terms of the uprising to the Provisional Government.

The uprising began on the night of October 24, the day the II Congress of Soviets opened. The government immediately succeeded in isolating it from the armed units loyal to it.

October 25 V.I. Lenin arrived at Smolny and personally led the uprising in Petrograd. During the October Revolution, the most important objects such as bridges, telegraph, government offices were seized.

On the morning of October 25, 1917, the Military Revolutionary Committee announced the overthrow of the Provisional Government and the transfer of power to the Petrograd Soviet of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies. On October 26, the Winter Palace was captured and members of the Provisional Government were arrested.

The October Revolution in Russia took place with the full support of the masses of the people. The alliance between the working class and the peasantry, the defection of the armed army to the side of the revolution, and the weakness of the bourgeoisie determined the results of the October Revolution of 1917.

On October 25 and 26, 1917, the II All-Russian Congress of Soviets was held, at which the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (VTsIK) was elected and the first Soviet government, the Council of People's Commissars (SNK), was formed. V.I. was elected Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars. Lenin. He put forward two Decrees: the "Decree on Peace", which called on the warring countries to stop hostilities, and the "Decree on Land", expressing the interests of the peasants.

The adopted Decrees contributed to the victory of Soviet power in the regions of the country.

On November 3, 1917, with the capture of the Kremlin, Soviet power also won in Moscow. Further, Soviet power was proclaimed in Belarus, Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, in the Crimea, in the North Caucasus, in Central Asia. The revolutionary struggle in Transcaucasia dragged on until the end of the civil war (1920-1921), which was a consequence of the October Revolution of 1917.

The Great October Socialist Revolution divided the world into two camps - capitalist and socialist.

By the evening of February 27, almost the entire composition of the Petrograd garrison - about 160 thousand people - went over to the side of the rebels. The commander of the Petrograd Military District, General Khabalov, is forced to inform Nicholas II: “I ask you to report to His Imperial Majesty that I could not fulfill the order to restore order in the capital. Most of the units, one after the other, betrayed their duty, refusing to fight against the rebels.

The idea of ​​a “cartel expedition”, which provided for the removal of hotel military units from the front and sending them to rebellious Petrograd, did not continue. All this threatened to turn into a civil war with unpredictable consequences.
Acting in the spirit of revolutionary traditions, the rebels released from prisons not only political prisoners, but also criminals. At first, they easily overcame the resistance of the Kresty guards, and then they took the Peter and Paul Fortress.

The unruly and motley revolutionary masses, not disdaining murders and robberies, plunged the city into chaos.
On February 27, at about 2 o'clock in the afternoon, the soldiers occupied the Tauride Palace. The State Duma found itself in a dual position: on the one hand, according to the decree of the emperor, it should have dissolved itself, but on the other hand, the pressure of the rebels and the virtual anarchy forced them to take some action. A compromise solution was a meeting under the guise of a "private meeting".
As a result, it was decided to form a body of power - the Provisional Committee.

Later, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Provisional Government, P. N. Milyukov, recalled:

“The intervention of the State Duma gave the street and military movement a center, gave it a banner and a slogan, and thereby turned the uprising into a revolution that ended in the overthrow of the old regime and dynasty.”

The revolutionary movement grew more and more. The soldiers capture the Arsenal, the main post office, telegraph, bridges and train stations. Petrograd was completely in the hands of the rebels. A real tragedy broke out in Kronstadt, which was swept by a wave of lynching, resulting in the murder of more than a hundred officers of the Baltic Fleet.
On March 1, the chief of staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, General Alekseev, in a letter implores the emperor "for the sake of saving Russia and the dynasty, put at the head of the government a person whom Russia would trust."

Nicholas declares that by giving rights to others, he deprives himself of the power granted to them by God. The opportunity for a peaceful transformation of the country into a constitutional monarchy had already been lost.

After the abdication of Nicholas II on March 2, a dual power actually developed in the state. Official power was in the hands of the Provisional Government, but real power belonged to the Petrograd Soviet, which controlled the troops, railways, post office and telegraph.
Colonel Mordvinov, who was on the royal train at the time of his abdication, recalled Nikolai's plans to move to Livadia. “Your Majesty, leave as soon as possible abroad. Under the current conditions, even in the Crimea there is no life,” Mordvinov tried to convince the king. "No way. I would not want to leave Russia, I love her too much, ”Nikolai objected.

Leon Trotsky noted that the February uprising was spontaneous:

“No one planned in advance the ways of a coup, no one from above called for an uprising. The indignation that had accumulated over the years broke out to a large extent unexpectedly for the masses themselves.

However, Milyukov, in his memoirs, insists that the coup was planned shortly after the start of the war and before "the army was supposed to go on the offensive, the results of which would radically stop all hints of discontent and would cause an explosion of patriotism and jubilation in the country." “History will curse the leaders of the so-called proletarians, but it will also curse us who caused the storm,” wrote the former minister.
The British historian Richard Pipes calls the actions of the tsarist government during the February uprising "fatal weakness of will", noting that "the Bolsheviks in such circumstances did not stop before executions."
Although the February Revolution is called "bloodless", it nevertheless claimed the lives of thousands of soldiers and civilians. In Petrograd alone, more than 300 people died and 1,200 were injured.

The February revolution began an irreversible process of the collapse of the empire and the decentralization of power, accompanied by the activity of separatist movements.

Independence was demanded by Poland and Finland, they started talking about independence in Siberia, and the Central Rada formed in Kyiv proclaimed "autonomous Ukraine".

The events of February 1917 allowed the Bolsheviks to come out of hiding. Thanks to the amnesty announced by the Provisional Government, dozens of revolutionaries returned from exile and political exile, who were already hatching plans for a new coup d'état.

October Revolution of 1917 in Russia

October Revolution(full official name in the USSR - Great October Socialist Revolution, alternative names: October coup, Bolshevik coup, third Russian revolution listen)) is a stage of the Russian revolution that took place in Russia in October of the year. As a result of the October Revolution, the Provisional Government was overthrown, and a government formed by the II Congress of Soviets came to power, in which the Bolshevik party received the majority shortly before the revolution - the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (Bolsheviks), in alliance with part of the Mensheviks, national groups, peasant organizations, some anarchists and a number of groups in the Socialist Revolutionary Party.

The main organizers of the uprising were V. I. Lenin, L. D. Trotsky, Ya. M. Sverdlov and others.

The government elected by the Congress of Soviets included representatives of only two parties: the RSDLP (b) and the Left Social Revolutionaries, the rest of the organizations refused to participate in the revolution. Later they demanded that their representatives be included in the Council of People's Commissars under the slogan of a "homogeneous socialist government," but the Bolsheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries already had a majority at the Congress of Soviets, allowing them not to rely on other parties. In addition, relations were spoiled by the support of the "compromising parties" of the persecution of the RSDLP (b) as a party and its individual members by the Provisional Government on charges of high treason and armed rebellion in the summer of 1917, the arrest of L. D. Trotsky and L. B. Kamenev and leaders of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, put on the wanted list of V. I. Lenin and G. E. Zinoviev.

There is a wide range of assessments of the October Revolution: for some, it is a national catastrophe that led to the Civil War and the establishment of a totalitarian system of government in Russia (or, conversely, to the death of Great Russia as an empire); for others - the greatest progressive event in the history of mankind, which made it possible to abandon capitalism and save Russia from feudal remnants; Between these extremes there are a number of intermediate points of view. Many historical myths are also associated with this event.

Name

S. Lukin. It's done!

The revolution took place on October 25, according to the Julian calendar, which was adopted in Russia at that time. And although already in February of the year the Gregorian calendar (new style) was introduced and the first anniversary of the revolution (like all subsequent ones) was celebrated on November 7, the revolution was still associated with October, which was reflected in its name.

The name "October Revolution" has been found since the first years of Soviet power. Name Great October Socialist Revolution established itself in the Soviet official historiography by the end of the 1930s. In the first decade after the revolution, it was often called, in particular, October coup, while this name did not carry a negative meaning (at least in the mouths of the Bolsheviks themselves), but, on the contrary, emphasized the grandiosity and irreversibility of the "social revolution"; this name is used by N. N. Sukhanov, A. V. Lunacharsky, D. A. Furmanov, N. I. Bukharin, M. A. Sholokhov. In particular, the section of Stalin's article, dedicated to the first anniversary of October (), was called About the October Revolution. Subsequently, the word "coup" became associated with a conspiracy and an illegal change of power (similar to palace coups), and the term was withdrawn from official propaganda (although Stalin used it until his last works, written already in the early 1950s). On the other hand, the expression "October coup" began to be actively used, already with a negative connotation, in literature critical of Soviet power: in emigre and dissident circles, and since perestroika, in the legal press.

background

There are several versions of the causes of the October Revolution:

• version of the spontaneous growth of the "revolutionary situation"
• version of the purposeful action of the German government (See Sealed wagon)

Version of the "revolutionary situation"

The main prerequisites for the October Revolution were the weakness and indecisiveness of the Provisional Government, its refusal to implement the principles proclaimed by it (for example, the Minister of Agriculture V. Chernov, the author of the Socialist Revolutionary program for land reform, defiantly refused to carry it out after he was told by his government colleagues that expropriation landowner lands damages the banking system, which credited the landlords on the security of land), dual power after the February Revolution. During the year, the leaders of the radical forces led by Chernov, Spiridonova, Tsereteli, Lenin, Chkheidze, Martov, Zinoviev, Stalin, Trotsky, Sverdlov, Kamenev and other leaders returned from hard labor, from exile and emigration to Russia and launched an extensive agitation. All this led to the strengthening of extreme left sentiments in society.

The policy of the Provisional Government, especially after the SR-Menshevik All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the Soviets declared the Provisional Government a "government of salvation", recognizing it as having "unlimited powers and unlimited power", brought the country to the brink of disaster. The smelting of pig iron and steel fell sharply, and the extraction of coal and oil was significantly reduced. The railway transport came to an almost complete breakdown. There was a sharp lack of fuel. In Petrograd, there were temporary interruptions in the supply of flour. Gross industrial output in 1917 decreased by 30.8% compared to 1916. In autumn, up to 50% of enterprises were closed in the Urals, Donbass and other industrial centers, 50 factories were stopped in Petrograd. There was massive unemployment. Food prices rose steadily. The real wages of workers fell by 40-50% compared with 1913. The daily expenditure on the war exceeded 66 million rubles.

All practical measures taken by the Provisional Government worked exclusively for the benefit of the financial sector. The provisional government resorted to money issue and new loans. In 8 months, it issued paper money worth 9.5 billion rubles, that is, more than the tsarist government in 32 months of the war. The main burden of taxes fell on the working people. The actual value of the ruble compared to June 1914 was 32.6%. The state debt of Russia in October 1917 amounted to almost 50 billion rubles, of which the debt to foreign powers amounted to more than 11.2 billion rubles. The country faced the threat of financial bankruptcy.

The provisional government, which did not have confirmation of its powers from any popular will, nevertheless, in a voluntaristic way, declared that Russia would "continue the war to a victorious end." Moreover, he failed to get the allies in the Entente to write off Russia's war debts, which reached astronomical sums. Explanations to the allies that Russia was not able to service this public debt, the experience of the state bankruptcy of a number of countries (Khedive Egypt, etc.) were not taken into account by the allies. Meanwhile, L. D. Trotsky officially declared that revolutionary Russia should not pay the bills of the old regime, and was immediately imprisoned.

The provisional government simply ignored the problem because the grace period on loans lasted until the end of the war. They turned a blind eye to the imminent post-war default, not knowing what to hope for and wanting to delay the inevitable. Wishing to postpone state bankruptcy by continuing an extremely unpopular war, they attempted to attack on the fronts, but their failure, emphasized by the "treacherous", according to Kerensky, surrender of Riga, caused extreme bitterness among the people. The land reform was also not carried out for financial reasons - the expropriation of landlords' lands would have caused a massive bankruptcy of financial institutions that credited landlords on the security of land. The Bolsheviks, historically supported by the majority of the workers of Petrograd and Moscow, won the support of the peasantry and soldiers ("peasants dressed in overcoats") through a consistent policy of agrarian reform and an immediate end to the war. In August-October 1917 alone, more than 2,000 peasant uprisings took place (690 peasant uprisings were registered in August, 630 in September, and 747 in October). The Bolsheviks and their allies actually remained the only force that did not agree to give up their principles in practice to protect the interests of Russia's financial capital.

Revolutionary sailors with the flag "Death to Bourgeois"

Four days later, on October 29 (November 11), an armed rebellion of junkers took place, including artillery pieces, which was also suppressed using artillery and armored cars.

On the side of the Bolsheviks were the workers of Petrograd, Moscow and other industrial centers, the land-poor peasants of the densely populated Chernozem region and Central Russia. An important factor in the victory of the Bolsheviks was the appearance on their side of a considerable part of the officers of the former tsarist army. In particular, the officers of the General Staff were distributed almost equally between the warring parties, with a slight advantage among the opponents of the Bolsheviks (at the same time, the Bolsheviks had a larger number of graduates of the Nikolaev Academy of the General Staff on the side of the Bolsheviks). Some of them were repressed in 1937 .

Immigration

At the same time, a number of workers, engineers, inventors, scientists, writers, architects, peasants, politicians from all over the world who shared Marxist ideas moved to Soviet Russia to participate in the program of building communism. They took some part in the technological breakthrough of backward Russia and the country's social transformations. According to some estimates, the number of Chinese and Manchus alone, who immigrated to Tsarist Russia due to the favorable socio-economic conditions created in Russia by the autocratic regime, and then took part in building a new world, exceeded 500 thousand people. , and for the most part they were workers who create material values ​​and transform nature with their own hands. Some of them quickly returned to their homeland, most of the rest were subjected to repression in the year

A certain number of specialists from Western countries also came to Russia. .

During the Civil War, tens of thousands of internationalist fighters (Poles, Czechs, Hungarians, Serbs, etc.) fought in the Red Army and voluntarily joined its ranks.

The Soviet government was forced to use the skills of some immigrants in administrative, military and other posts. Among them are the writer Bruno Yasensky (shot in the city), administrator Bela Kun (shot in the city), economists Varga and Rudzutak (shot in the year), special services officers Dzerzhinsky, Latsis (shot in the city), Kingisepp, Eichmans (shot in the year), military leaders Joachim Vatsetis (shot in the year), Lajos Gavro (shot in), Ivan Strod (shot in), August Kork (shot in the year), head of Soviet justice Smilgu (shot in the year), Inessa Armand and many others. The financier and intelligence officer Ganetsky (shot in), aircraft designers Bartini (repressed in the city, spent 10 years in prison), Paul Richard (worked in the USSR for 3 years and returned to France), teacher Yanoushek (shot in a year), Romanian, Moldovan and Jewish poet Yakov Yakir (who ended up in the USSR against his will with the annexation of Bessarabia, was arrested there, left for Israel), socialist Henrich Erlich (sentenced to death and committed suicide in the Kuibyshev prison), Robert Eikhe ( shot in the year), journalist Radek (shot in the year), Polish poet Naftali Kon (twice repressed, after his release he left for Poland, from there to Israel), and many others.

Holiday

Main article: Anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution

Contemporaries about the revolution

Our children and grandchildren will not even be able to imagine the Russia in which we once lived, which we did not appreciate, did not understand - all this power, complexity, wealth, happiness ...

• October 26 (November 7) - birthday of L.D. Trotsky

Notes

1. MINUTES of 1920 August 11-12 days judicial investigator for especially important cases at the Omsk District Court N. A. Sokolov in Paris (in France), in the order of 315-324 Art. Art. mouth corner. court., examined three issues of the newspaper “Obshchee Delo” provided for investigation by Vladimir Lvovich Burtsev.
2. Russian National Corpus
3. Russian National Corpus
4. I. V. Stalin. The logic of things
5. I. V. Stalin. Marxism and questions of linguistics
6. For example, the expression "October Revolution" is often used in the anti-Soviet magazine "Posev":
7. S. P. Melgunov. Golden german key of the Bolsheviks
8. L. G. Sobolev. Russian revolution and German gold
9. Ganin A.V. On the role of officers of the General Staff in the civil war.
10. S. V. Kudryavtsev Liquidation of "counter-revolutionary organizations" in the region (Author of Candidate of Historical Sciences)
11. Erlikhman V.V. "Loss of population in the XX century". Reference book - M .: Publishing house "Russian panorama", 2004 ISBN 5-93165-107-1
12. Cultural Revolution Article on rin.ru
13. Soviet-Chinese relations. 1917-1957. Collection of documents, Moscow, 1959; Ding Shouhe, Yin Xu Yi, Zhang Bozhao, The Impact of the October Revolution on China, translated from Chinese, Moscow, 1959; Peng Ming, History of Sino-Soviet Friendship, translated from Chinese. Moscow, 1959; Russian-Chinese relations. 1689-1916, Official documents, Moscow, 1958
14. Border clearances and other forced migrations in 1934-1939.
15. "Great Terror": 1937-1938. Brief chronicle Compiled by N. G. Okhotin, A. B. Roginsky
16. From among the descendants of immigrants, as well as local residents who originally lived on their historical lands, as of 1977, 379 thousand Poles lived in the USSR; 9 thousand Czechs; 6 thousand Slovaks; 257 thousand Bulgarians; 1.2 million Germans; 76 thousand Romanians; 2 thousand French; 132 thousand Greeks; 2 thousand Albanians; 161 thousand Hungarians, 43 thousand Finns; 5 thousand Khalkha Mongols; 245,000 Koreans, etc. Most of them are the descendants of the colonists of tsarist times, who have not forgotten their native language, and residents of the border, ethnically mixed regions of the USSR; some of them (Germans, Koreans, Greeks, Finns) were subsequently subjected to repressions and deportations.
17. L. Anninsky. In memory of Alexander Solzhenitsyn. Historical magazine "Rodina" (RF), No. 9-2008, p. 35
18. I.A. Bunin "Cursed Days" (diary 1918 - 1918)

Links

• The Great October Socialist Revolution on the wiki section of the RKSM(b) portal

October 10, 1917 - The Bolshevik Central Committee decides on an armed uprising.

October 12- Creation of the Military Revolutionary Committee under the Petrograd Soviet ( VRK) to guide the seizure of power.

Mid October - Kerensky makes an attempt to bring part of the Petrograd garrison to the front. This pushes the garrison, which does not want to fight, to the side of the Bolsheviks, becoming the main condition for the success of the October Revolution.

October 23- Dispatch by Trotsky of the commissars of the Military Revolutionary Committee to most of the Petrograd military units of the garrison. The Peter and Paul Fortress (where there are cannons and an arsenal with 100 thousand rifles) goes over to the side of the Bolsheviks.

October 24- Under the guise of defense against the “counter-revolution”, the Military Revolutionary Committee begins a systematic silent capture of the capital by small groups of soldiers and Red Army men.

pre-parliament actually denies Kerensky the authority to suppress the Bolshevik rebellion in order "not to provoke a civil war."

Deputies arrive in Petrograd II Congress of Soviets". Its composition was rigged by the Bolsheviks in advance: representatives of only 300 (according to other sources, only 100) of the 900 existing in the country gather at the congress. Soviets- and predominantly members of the Leninist party (335 out of 470 deputies, while the true proportion in local councils is completely different).

On a front completely decomposed by the Communists, it is almost impossible to assemble troops to help the Provisional Government. Kerensky accidentally finds a detachment of the general near Pskov Krasnova, in which - only 700 Cossacks. Krasnov agrees to lead him against the Bolsheviks to Petrograd (where there is a 160,000-strong garrison from the reserve regiments that refused to go to the front, not counting the sailors).

29th of October- The Bolsheviks begin to disarm the Petrograd junkers. They are resisting. The result is fierce battles with artillery around the Pavlovsk and Vladimir schools; twice as many victims as on Bloody Sunday, January 9, 1905.

Reinforcements arrive at Krasnov in the evening: another 600 Cossacks, 18 guns and an armored train. However, his forces are still insignificant for further movement on Petrograd.

The cowardly Colonel Ryabtsev negotiates a daily truce with the Moscow Military Revolutionary Committee. During these days, the Bolsheviks are pulling reinforcements from everywhere to Moscow.

November 8- Lenin removes Commander-in-Chief Dukhonin, replacing him with a Bolshevik ensign Krylenko. Lenin's radiogram: let all soldiers and sailors themselves, regardless of their superiors, enter into negotiations on a truce with the enemy - the final surrender of Russia to mercy